This labor was much longer and many times more painful than Rowan's birth. I was in labor for two whole days.
Sunday evening at around 5:00pm, I started having moderately strong, sort of regular contractions. A few would be ten minutes apart, then a few would be five...and then they would jump up to fifteen minutes apart. The pain of the contractions wasn't even that bad...but there was this inexplicable pain at the bottom of my uterus that I just couldn't explain. It was a sharp, stabbing pain that didn't let up and didn't allow me to rest.
My midwife stopped by to assess the situation...and we really couldn't figure out a reason for the pain. After several hours, she went home, since I was only two centimeters dilated. Not long after she left, the sharp pain got even sharper and much more intense.
Unable to figure out what was going on, we decided to go into the hospital to get it checked out.
Everyone in the hospital was really quite nice. They checked me (I was at four by this time) and did an ultrasound. Everything looked quite normal and they couldn't see any reason for the pain.
Then the attending came in to the room.
He started throwing around demeaning phrases like
"So...you want to be in pain?"
"Pregnancy is inherantly dangerous."
"The only time your baby is safe is in the hospital nursery."
"You think you're built for this?"
"You want to do this naturally? A broken bone is natural..."
He asked me what I wanted the hospital to do for me. I said I just wanted to get checked out to make sure this extra pain accompanying my normal labor pains wasn't anything "wrong". And then I wanted to go home.
"Well, we don't know if anything is wrong. We won't know unless you have the baby here, in the hospital."
I told him that since all the tests came back fine that I would just go back home. I did want one more internal exam to make sure I didn't dilate to something crazy like 7 or 8 before we took the drive. I didn't want the baby to be born on the side of the road. I asked him if the doctor that gave me the exam before could do it one more time.
"I don't think we need to complicate things with another exam. If you want us to help you, we can do that but if not..." He trailed off.
My husband stood up, "So, unless she stays she can't have another exam? You're holding an exam over my wife's head?"
My good friend who was there with my husband, midwife and I was so enraged she offered to go get the other doctor herself.
After some more back and forth, I said "forget it" and unhooked myself from the machines. We would sign the papers and go home.
After he left, nurses came in and apologized for this rude doctor. They got the other, kinder female doctor to check me. There was no change so we signed the "leaving against medical advice" papers and got out of there.
So, we got back home around 5:00 am. I was able to sleep on and off again until 8:00am. All day long, my contractions were very irregular, accompanied by the unexplained sharp pain. I could not relax.
We tried everything -- walking, in the tub, out of the tub...nothing got things going. After many hours I progressed to five and then after many more hours I got to six. The sun was going down for a second time and I was getting really, really tired.
Even though I was progressing, we still weren't 100% sure this was true labor because I wasn't showing the emotional signposts of labor.
Finally, we had to make a decision -- to either try to stick this out or go in for pitocin and an epidural. I was pretty much on the verge of begging to go in.
We came to a happy medium -- we would go to my husband's parent's house, which was half way to the hospital and see if a change of scenery would help. We called ahead and they situated the upstairs for us, which consists of two bedrooms and a bathroom.
When we got there, I walked and walked around the downstairs, going to hands and knees or clinging to furniture during contractions. They were really, really strong...but I was so tired I could barely stand it. I still was chatty inbetween contractions...thankfully they were establishing a pattern and getting closer together.
By this point, I could barely keep my eyes open! I went upstairs to lie down...time got weird by this point. I really can't remember a whole lot of what happened next besides pain and wanting it to be over.
My midwife checked me again. I was at nine and could be stretched to ten. I couldn't believe it.
But I had no urge to push, I was way too tired.
My husband got in my face and really made me snap to it. A mirror in place helped me focus...somehow I suddenly remembered -- I was having a baby!
A few pushes later Ember was born! She was caught by my mother in law in my husband's old bedroom. I was so tired that I didn't think to check the gender. My midwife asked my husband to look and see.
He did the funniest thing: he lifted her leg up, much like you would a puppy or a kitten, to check!
"Its a girl!"
My whole pregnancy I just knew it would be a girl. And boy, was she huge! Two whole pounds larger than Rowan at birth.
After the newborn exam everything was really easy...we got all cleaned up, ate, called a few people, then went to sleep! :)
*Edit: We did eventually find out the cause of all that extra pain! Ember's hand, elbow, and shoulder were all pushed across her face, pressing against me rather hard.
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